Actions & Consequences
by Browncoat214
Summary: Because all actions have consequences.  Sorry if any characters are a bit OOC!


**A/N Made with the songs I Hate Everything About You by Three Days Grace and Here Without You by 3 Doors Down in mind.**

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Actions & Consequences

She'd started being sick, not eating properly, waking up in the night freezing but with a little more than a film of sweat slicking her hair against her face. They could all be passed off as an illness someone might pick up when constantly on the run from a giant company like Abstergo.  
No one had even suspected Shaun and Rebecca had had sex until she started showing.  
It had been a one-time thing at a time when everything was going to hell closely followed, they had thought, by them. A flurry of last-minute passion that had started with tears and a comforting embrace.

Shaun, always the first to find a distraction from the morally perverted way of life, laid before him by the Assassin's Creed, had been overjoyed. Finally something to give his life a sense of normality, something for him to fight for other than the selfish extension of his own life, brought about by the death of others.

Rebecca however, remained grounded, her worry for her unborn child causing most of her symptoms and the child itself causing the rest. This life was not one in which a person could be born into. The Brotherhood maybe, but not this life of running and fear and deprivation. They had to keep going, always just a day longer. Always only one step ahead of the Templars.

The arguments between them raged for weeks, never on the road or when their cooperation was needed but at every stop and safehouse you could hear them shouting at each other, both dead set against each other, both understanding the others argument. Both unsure of what to do and afraid of this choice that they should not have to make.

Rebecca looked at Shaun with her sorrowful eyes and the worry consuming her and that had already taken the spark out of her, barely hidden. "Shaun, we can't do this. We can't… Not this life… Not this time… Not here… It shouldn't be done… Can't be done… Impossible…"  
She had always avoided addressing 'the problem at hand'. It annoyed Shaun every time she did it. That never helped. "What are we going to do then? This is not going to take care of itself."  
"We can't keep it."  
"What do you plan to do then!"  
Rebecca was usually found curled on the floor, screaming silently, tears streaming into her short hair.

Shaun decided to work another late night, compiling files, piecing sketchy information together, untangling memory data, just to switch off. His left hand swiped at his eyes, pinching his nose under his glasses then trailing down his cheek. Elbow on desk, head in hand, he stared back at the computer screen. He doesn't even notice Rebecca quietly weeping behind him until she gasps for the air around her. He turns around immediately, standing to embrace her, one hand in her dark hair, one arm encircling her inflated waist protectively, as she sobbed into his shoulder, her tears soaking through his thin shirt. He rested his cheek on the side of her head. Through the sobs that wracked her body she whispered two words, barely even loud enough for Shaun to hear, "forgive me?"  
"Of course," he answered, his voice more gentle than she had heard it in a long time. "This isn't your fault, isn't anyone's fault. You shouldn't have been put through this. No one should be put through this. I'm sorry." He held her and they stood and swayed gently until Rebecca's sobs had died to broken breathing and salty trails down her face and watery, tired eyes.

She closed her eyes. Shaun had already forgiven her, he probably didn't know what for but he had. Did that still count? She glanced down at her belly for the first time in a while. Actually for the first time come to think of it. "Hello baby." She whispered, putting a hand over the distended bump and smiling sadly. She had been sad and scared far too often in these past few months and she was almost sure this wouldn't fix anything but the alternative… 'There is no alternative' she had spent the sleepless hours in bed convincing herself. She removed the hand from her stomach. Looking down at the metal stairs of the fire escape she closed her eyes before tears could escape. "I'm so sorry. Bye bye baby." She let her knees crumble below her, tumbling down the solid stairs. Pain overwhelmed her and she relished it, knowing she deserved every moment of it before darkness overcame her.

She woke in a hospital bed, three assassins in the room with her. Desmond paced the small room, his face an unreadable mask. Lucy sat beside her, her hand clamped round Rebecca's own, concern etched in every feature. Shaun simply sat in a comfy chair in the corner, his head in his hands and fingers under his glasses. Lucy smiled as she realised Rebecca was awake. "Hey," she cooed, "how are you feeling?"

Rebecca sat up despite the shooting pains in her protesting body, "ok, I guess," a hand ghosted over her abdomen. Lucy's face darkened and her hand squeezed Rebecca's even harder as she shook her head.

"Oh God." Tears stung the back of Rebecca's eyes, her lip trembling.

"I'm so sorry," came Lucy's whispers of condolence before she left the room with Desmond accompanying her.

"Shaun?" Rebecca questioned the silent room in a broken voice. He looked at her, unbound grief in his spilling eyes. She broke his gaze, trying to hide her guilt. "I'm sorry. I don't know what happened. I just fell." She saw tears hit the sheet under her eyes as she tried to convince herself as well as Shaun that she had fainted or slipped or misstepped… Anything but the truth.

"It's ok, love." Shaun's voice came cold from across the room before Rebecca heard his steps click across the hospital floor and out the sliding glass door.

"I just fell," she cried out to the empty hospital room before numbness took her.

That spark never did find its way back to her.


End file.
